>> good for him. good senator. we need good senators. that's it for me. thanks very much for watching. all of our super tuesday coverage tomorrow. for now, i'm wolf blitzer in "the situation room." "the situation room." the news continues next. -- captions by vitac -- www.vitac.com >> i'm john king. tonight, president obama and israel prime minister netanyahu side by side in the oval office still far part how best to stop iran's nuclear program. plus the biggest day of the 2012 campaign so far. romney's rivals sharpen the attacks fearing a big super tuesday could give him an insurmountable lead. and a pay for pain rocks the nfl. a coach now under investigation and who sees nothing wrong with offering cash bounties for bone-jarring hits. we begin with the growing crisis affecting what you pay at the

gas pump and casts a big shadow over obama's hopes for re-election. just a day after dismissing what he called loose talk of war with iran, he sat down with benjamin netanyahu. at the top of their agenda, talk that israel may soon attack iran's nuclear sites. jessica yellin working sources all day. take us inside three hours of talks and a working lunch later, what do we know? >> reporter: we're told the prime minister and the president within their three hours had 30 minutes when they were one-on-one. none of us will know really what they talked about when they were alone together. but the most pressing question, did they discuss red lines, and we are told by u.s. and israeli officials that that was not what the the two leaders sat down to talk about. that this was essentially a meeting to make clear to each leader where they stand on these fundamental issues of what it would take to press each other for an attack, but they did not

ask each other fundamentally for the go-ahead, which is what we're talking about when we talk about these red lines. so the topic of red lines was not the purpose of this discussion. but many of the very fundamental topics of the iranian nuclear issue were all covered during these three hours of talks, john. >> and jess, it's a very important relationship. president obama promising the united states would always have israel's back but he is publicly saying give diplomacy and sanctions more time. the prime minister not even mentioning sanctions in his remarks from the oval office. how difficult is it resolving this issue when these two leaders clearly have friction in their own relationship? >> reporter: well, there's clear differences between the two men, and all sides insist that the personality differences aren't the issue here. what the fundamental challenge is is that there is a difference in policy. for the u.s., the question is

about timing. that as you say, the president believes and administration officials believe there is space and time that there is up to a year to know when iran should start, if they should start developing a nuclear weapon, they have a year's lead time know and be able to strike if that's the decision and the president has made it clear he issal to use military options if it should come to that. israel believes they have less time because they are smaller and have less of a military ability to strike and that is the fundamental difference. but all sides are minimizing that difference now and projecting unity to the world because they want to look as if they are as close to on the same page as possible so the rest of the world can press ahead on sanctions and other actions against iran, john, and press other options so that the military option is the last one they might have to resort to. john? >> our chief white house correspondent, jessica yellin. other major international story,

senator john mccain today called for usair strikes on syria. during an impassioned speech this afternoon, he said military intervention now the only way to stop the blood shed that's claimed at least 7500 lives in the past year. a senior pentagon official tells us leon pa net at that time feels u.s. intervention could make things worse in syria at this time. i spoking to senator mccain a short time ago. >> if you talk to folks at the pentagon, they say they share your goals but getting the united statesen involved that way will put too many civilians in syria at risk. how would you answer that? >> my answer is right now, in case they missed it, there's thousands of people being massacred by thanks and artillery used by bashar assad. i heard that same argument when we decided to go into bosnia, and i heard the same argument when we went into coso vo. so if they want to disregard the continuing massacre ha in the view of many could go on for months or even a year or more,

then that's their choice, but please don't tell us it's because they're worried about casualties. they're going on as we speak. >> you remember how tough it was at the time to get international support for bogs nia and kosovo, sir. should the united states act alone if that support does not exist in your view? >> i don't think soaps because i think it would be extremely difficult to do that. i think i would face that -- my answer is i think i would face that eventuality once i got there, what the united states can do for a change is lead, is lead. and make sure that we work with the arab league, with other countries, the saudis have already said they want to send arms to the resistance in syria and so have other countries. and we saw what could be done in libya. so, it's one of these things that you can always find reasons not to, including quote we don't know who they are. i heard that in libya, in

tunisia, heard that in egypt. but the fact is, massacres are going on. the united states is sitting by and not doing anything about it. >> are you going to take thanks and artillery that are in residential neighborhoods, that would involve a lot of risks. would it not be best if you're going to do that to put covert boots on the ground to find them and track them. >> i think there are many things you can do. in other countries as in libya might be willing to do that. we have precision guided bombs. we've proven that on many occasions, most recently in libya when our allies were using precision guided weapons. i want to repeat, john, you will find a thousand reasons not to do the right thing. every time we've been involved, i've heard the same excuses, and in this particular case, if we want to stand by and watch syrians being massacred in the most brutal and incredibly genocidal fashion, then that is a decision we can make.

but please don't tell me we can't do it. we can if we have the will. >> a provocative proposal tonight from the senator mccain. thanks for your time. >> thank you, john. to the red hot presidential race. only hours away from the first poll openingses of super tuesday. ten states hold contests tomorrow, more than 400 delegates at stake. the biggest contested prize is ohio where a brand-new cnn orc poll shows romney and santorum tied with 32% each. of newt gingrich leading big in his home state of georgia and santorum holds a tiny edge over romney in the tennessee numbers. romney predicts he'll win the nomination if he can carry ohio and several other states. his election eve message focused on jobs. >> what i know is the economy. i spent my life in the real economy. i understand why jobs come and why they go. other people in this race have debated about the economy. they've read about the economy. they've talked about it in subcommittee meetings.

but i've actually been in it. >> once comfortable ohio lead now gone. rick santorum barnstorming across the state fighting for every last vote. >> growing up, having to fight for everything you got, is exactly the kind of person that we need to have. not just in the white house with the big problems that are facing this country. but in this election, someone who doesn't think you can buy it, someone who knows you can't buy it. you got to earn it. >> cnn national political correspondent jim acosta is in zanesville, ohio. mitt romney signed sounding like a confident campaign heading into super tuesday. how do they define the stakes? >> they are feeling it in ohio. you heard governor romney at an event in youngstown saying if he could win ohio, he feels he could win the gop nomination.

that is not something you say on super tuesday unless you're feeling pretty good. why not in the they've erased a double digit lead from rick santorum in the last week. you'll appreciate this as somebody who crunches the numbers. they feel like they're going to win the lion's share on super tuesday. they have targeted some of these states by congressional district going into places in atlanta, knowing they won't win the state of georgia but feel they can pick up delegates by doing well in some of the suburban areas in that crucial state on super tuesday. and something else that the romney campaign has been saying, an adviser earlier today telling reporters they're telling members of congress, republican members of congress up on capitol hill, asking the question, who do you want on this ticket? do you want mitt romney or rick santorum? eric fern strom at romney advisers said rick santorum would be like cement shoes for republicans also on that ticket. it's all part of the romney message they're the only campaign ready for primetime in

this campaign. >> jim across ta live for us on the trail. thanks so much. let's take a closer look at the stakes. our chief political analyst gloria borger is here. the states filled in are the states we've already had. you see more romney red than anything else. santorum purple in the middle. romney expects to win massachusetts and vermont, he expects to win virginia. he thinks he'll win out here in idaho, question mark about this one, maybe ron paul, maybe mitt romney and here's the biggest battleground tomorrow, the state of ohio. if romney wins, as he says today, i'm the nominee. do you buy that? >> i think if he wins ohio, it's sort of the beginning of the end if you will. you can make the case that he's won five going into this. if he wins ohio, bellwether in a general election no, republican presidential candidate has ever won the presidency without winning ohio. i think he needs to win ohio. it's interesting to me is in

talking to people in the campaign, i think they're feeling better and better about tennessee which is a southern state and you know, romney in 2008 did not win any southern states when he was going for that will nomination. it would be very important lift to him to win the state of tennessee. >> especially because people will write off virginia saying santorum, gingrich not on the ballot. >> he won't get any credit for na. >> take a different look at the race. let's bring up the del map instead. here's where we are going in, governor romney with the lead. if you play this out, and you just go through this here, if romney wins these states here, i gave santorum tennessee in this calculation. oklahoma goes to santorum. i'm not sure about north dakota. we gave it to romney. if you look at it here, even if we give that state to ron paul, this is somewhere in the ballpark where governor romney could end up tomorrow night. a long way ahead of his rivals. >> then he begins to become the prohibitive favorite.

what we've seen already, you've seen prominent conservatives, eric cantor, a leader in the house, tom coburn, senator from oklahoma, republican, very conservative, going into the romney camp. so what i think you would start to see is this question of inevitability or electability sort of coming to play. and romney would have the momentum that he wants and you know, nothing succeeds like success, right? so you keep winning. you keep winning. that's what they want to be talking about tomorrow night. they could easily win over half of the delegates. tomorrow night. and we're going to be talking about popular vote as well, but if they win over half the delegates tomorrow night, i think they're going to say, you know what? we're the big winners here. >> it does get hard even though that's a long way to 1144, especially with three other people in the race, it gets hard to make up the gap as you go forward. big night tomorrow. newt gingrich needs a victory in georgia, his home state to keep his campaign alive. our new poll indicates he's

likely to get it, he leads 47% to 24% with santorum at 159%, ron paul at 9%. campaigning today in the neighboring state of tennessee where polls indicate he's running third, the former speaker took swipes at his favorite targets. >> the elite media was fascinated with rush limbaugh and should he have apologized. i kept coming back and saying the apology i worry about is barack obama apologizing to religious fanatics while they're killing young americans. and so let's start. i want to give you my commitment. i will not apologize as commander in chief. >> stand by for more on tonight's top story. despite hours of white house meetings, there's no sign the united states and israel closer to findsing ground on stopping iran's quest for nuclear weapons. and later, incredible pictures from the international space station show the beauty of nature and the work of human hands. prairie, minnesota. in here,

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united states would always have israel's back but also made clear it was not in his view time just yet to move toward military options. >> even as weise will continue on the diplomatic front, we will continue to tighten pressure when it comes to sanctions. >> now, prime minister netanyahu never mentioned sanctions in his remarks and made it clear israel would act alone if he believed it was necessary. >> israel must reserve the right to defend itself. and after all, that's the very purpose of the jewish state to restore to the jewish people control over our destiny. >> let's get important perspective from fareed zakaria. the prime minister of israel did get the president of the united states to say all options including military options are on the table but did we resolve anything else? prime minister netanyahu says if i decide to act, il act. >> i don't think we've resolved

very much. the situation remains very, very dangerous because you have a situation where you have an enormous amount of pressure being placed on iran without a diplomat tract. the president talked about how he thought diplomat sit would the succeed. we have to diplomatic track with iran. the israelis continue to say they reserve the right to act and all the while, oil prices continue to go up. we have all this pressure on iran. they haven't moved. prices of oil continue to go up and israel reserves the right to do a military strike. this doesn't strike me as a successful conclusion to the problem. >> and for better or worse, and i suspect worse is the answer. this is playing out in the middle of a presidential campaign in which the president's republican critics have been quite vociferous in saying he's too soft here. paul begala calls foreign policy the potential wildcard in the campaign and says in this standoff, oil prices could

skyrocket and terrorism against american coz spike overseas and here at home. the political fallout is difficult to predict. is one thing prime minister netanyahu is counting on president obama facing so much criticism from the right. >> he does not have the much cover to try and initiate some kind of diplomat sit, secret unofficial tract two, whatever you may call it but any of the kind of diplomacy that has tended to resolve these kinds of problems in the past, the opening to china, things like that. the minute that were to happen and if it were to leak, he would be pilloried on the right. so he politically is fine where he is. he can go further right and he'll be fine. you know, he can be even tougher on the iranians but he doesn't have any space to go or to try negotiations to try diplomacy. and yet, it's difficult to see how you resolve the crisis without trying diplomacy. >> and if you're looking around

the world trying for diplomatic help, trying to toughen the sanctions, for example, you would have to look to russia. president putin, it will be president putin coming back into power after running a campaign in which account anti-americanism was front gronk can president obama, can the united states count on help from russia? >> putin is a very practical guy. he is not going to do this out of the love of his heart but he will do it if he sees that there is a deal to be made, if there are advantages for him in doing it, and russia is looking for ways to assert itself on the international stage. if russia can be kind of the crucial broker in a deal that involves you know inspections in iran, i think they would go along with it. the real window that is closing is that the israelis know that if they act between now and november, they will have the unqualified support of the american administration. because it will be politically impossible for the obama administration to do anything but support an israeli strike.

>> come november, if president obama is re-elected, frankly, even if there were president romney, it all changes because at that point, the president is not under political pressure, is not running a presidential campaign. and can take a somewhat more less political view of the situation. and i think the israelis understand american politics very well and they understand that between now and november, were there to be an israeli strike, they would be in much better shape with regard to the crucial thing they care about, which is america's unqualified support of that strike. >> very important point there, fareed, thank you. >> pleasure. members of the u.s. military about to get a break at one u.s. airport. just happens to be the one closest to the pentagon. stand by for details of a new program that could make it easier for men and women in uniform to get around. later, a player who sees nothing wronging with offering cash bounties for hits that injure other players. score did ♪ ♪ with a free-credit-score-dot-com ♪

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welcome back. here's kate bolduan with the news you feed to know right now. >> happy monday, everyone. let's get to some news we have. there's word today iran's supreme court canceled the death sentence of a u.s. man convicted of spying and sent his case back to a lower court. the former marine was picked up last august while visiting relatives. the iranians claim he was working for an enemy country and say he's in the cia. his family in the u.s. denied that. also, starting later this month at reagan national airport

here in washington, a military i.d. called the common access card will get service personnel into the government's expedited screening program called precheck. they won't have to take off shoes or coats or pull laptop computers out of carry-on bags. the program is supposed to expand to 35 airports by year's end. and finally, take a look at these awesome pictures of the earth at night. as seen from the international space station. it's really just amazing. obviously, these are time lapse. you can see the orange lights of cities, lightning flashing and thunderstorms and the ghostly green light of auroras. you can see it right there. nasa posted the time lapse videos today on its astronomy picture of the day website. i watched that twice today. it's amazing to see the whole thing. >> only twice? >> i had other stuff to do. >> other important work to do, fascinating watch. love pictures like that. still ahead here, rush limbaugh's apology to the

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coming up in half hour, rush limbaugh feels the financial consequences of calling a law student a slut. her views on contraceptives,

more advertisers are gone. >> and a group.girl scouts try to chase down someone who stole their cookie money. first, mitt romney and rick santorum in ohio, both are campaigning right now. tomorrow, super tuesday could be one of the most important days in the republican presidential campaign. ten states vote, ohio is one of the biggest prizes with 63 delegates at stake tomorrow. right now, mitt romney and rick santorum in a dead heat there. our senior congressional correspondent dana bash is live in butler county. you're in a bar once owned by speaker john boehner. both santorum and romney want that district, want the state. what are you hearing on the ground? >> reporter: they want it and they need it big-time. this is butler county. and what i'm hearing on the ground, john, is a real mix. this should be santorum country. this is heavily blue collar

working class ear area. these are the kind of voters he's going for, very conservative. still some people saying i like santorum, i want romney because of the electability factor. still a lot of undecided voters. i mentioned i am in the bar once owned by speaker boehner. we have one of the sister of the speaker, lynn dan biner mine na key you are a voter here. you're going to be one of the people who has your voice out there in the primary tomorrow. how do you feel about the candidates? >> it's confusing. all the bashing against one another. it makes it hard for people to decide. they're worried about what the other ones are doing instead of us. >> are you enthused about any of the candidates? >> huh-uh, no, not really. >> and you've been -- you've been watching television. there's been ad after ad after add. is that confusing? >> they're talking about this one did that wrong and not what they're going do for us.

some people are very undecided. >> you want to have a cap on campaign spending. >> exactly. >> i'm not sure your brother would like that. >> john, this is a perfect example of what we are hearing here. confusion and actually a lot of dissatisfaction even from the speaker of the house's sister. >> dana bash live. get a drink. i wouldn't mind one right now. the bar formerly owned by john boehner. of course, when super tuesday night, rick santorum is now statistically tied with romney in both ohio and tennessee. 118 delegates up for grabs tomorrow in those twos states. rick santorum couldn't make all the filing requirements. let's bring in his top adviser live in washington tonight. john, can you win -- we've got some -- audio difficulties. can we fix this up? we'll take a quick break. we'll be with you in just a second. ? delicious gourmet gravy. and she agrees. with fancy feast gravy lovers, your cat can enjoy

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we've worked out our technical difficulties. john brabender is the top advisor to rick santorum's presidential campaign. he joins us this evening from washington. it's super tuesday tomorrow. if we rewound the tape or so ago, santorum would be well ahead in ohio and tennessee and oklahoma. but on the eve of that voting, santorum is ahead in oklahoma in a dead heat in tennessee and ohio. happened? >> well, first of all, some of the polls also show rick

santorum ahead in ohio and some ahead any tennessee. i think what you've got to factor in the bigger question i have is mitt romney came out today between his campaign and his super pac has spent $12 million in ohio alone. we've spent about $565,000 in ohio. how does someone spend $12 million and right now in the polls your poll, only be at 32%, almost 70% of ohioans say they're not ready to vote for romney despite him spending $12 million. so same thing happened in michigan last week. we got outspent 6 to 1 but left with the same number of delegates as mitt rom 234i in his home state. how does someone spend that much money and get that few delegates. >> i find it interesting he's struggling as much as he is with all that spending going on. >> he is struggling. he is spending much more. no doubt about that. however, he's won five states in a row regardless of how he's done it, he's done it within the rules. you may not like he spent like

that. what happens if he wins five out of ten, six out of ten tomorrow and gets more than half the delegates tomorrow night? yes, he's still a long way from 144, but he's well ahead of everybody else. >> yeah, look, this is a lot like the super bowl. i'm sure the patriots would have liked to have called the game. interesting, rick santorum has won more counties in all these states so far than mitt romney. there's a long ways to go. in fairness, you have a lot of big states, including rick santorum's home state of pennsylvania which has not voted yet. the problem you always have is mitt romney has so many houses he has so many home states. but you know, this is really very, very early on. tomorrow as you know, there's ten states and we're going to see what happens. but all these states seem to be very, very close. which says there's no clear front runner. >> no clear front-runner perhaps although governor romney is starting to put together a win streak in part because you still

have the conservative vote split between santorum and speaker gingrich. you said recently when you were asked if newt gingrich should drop out, we need that will or gingrich's supporters to shift in santorum's direction. here's his response directly to you. >> tell his top advise ser i'm taking rick santorum's advice. he stayed in. he was running fourth in every single primary. suddenly he cleverly went to three states, nobody else went to and he became the media darling and bounced back. >> well, i'm glad. >> if this stays a four-person race, congressman paul is running as well, is mitt romney the nominee? >> i think it makes it harder. you take a state like ohio tomorrow where according to your poll, gingrich's support is way below. if you could get all those ohio people that think they're voting for gingrich and say we want to vote for the another conservative rick santorum and stop mitt romney, that shows that we can win these type of states. i think in states like ohio tomorrow, that will be very

important for people to come to that conclusion. >> it's a big night today, a bigger day tomorrow. john brabender, appreciate your time tonight. we'll checking in in those ten states tomorrow. >> thank you for having me on. >> you are welcome. >> 12 advertisers now gone from rush limbaugh's radio show after limbaugh, as you know, called a georgetown university law student a slut for his views on contraception. he apologized but not enough to hold on to many sponsors. here's lisa sylvester. >> the rewhacks was swift and fierce. advertisers pulling ads from the limbaugh show including aol which says we have determined that mr. limbaugh's comments are not in line with our values. part of the backlash he now faces after he went after law student sandra fluke with these fighting words on his february 29th program. >> what does it say about the college coed susan fluke who

goes off a congressional committee and essentially says that she must be paid to have sex? what does that make her. >> reporter: it makes her a slut, right? makes her a prostitute. she wants to be paid to have sex. >> fluke had appeared at a democratic congressional hearing arguing in favor of broad health care coverage for birth control. limbaugh issued a statement on saturday apologizing for his comments. and followed up with another apology on his radio show. >> the apology was heartfelt. the apology was sincere. >> he also took full aim at liberal groups accusing them of orchestrating a campaign to silence him. he says there are plenty of commentators on the left who have said inflammatory statements against sarah palin and other conservatives without being condemned and to advertisers this message. >> those advertiser who no longer want your business, fine. we'll replace them. it's simple. advertising is a business

decision. it's not a social one. only the leftists try to use extortion, pressure, threats tore silence opposing voices. we don't do that. >> fluke appeared on show "the view" not swayed by limbaugh's apologies. >> i don't think a statement like this issued saying that his choice of words was not the best changes anything. and especially when that statement is issued when he's under significant pressure everywhere his sponsors who have begun to pull their support. >> limbaugh has now lost his first radio station over the sandra fluke comments. a stationings in hawaii is dropping his show. right now limbaugh still has the backing of clear channel and there is reportedly a backlog of advertisers wanting to advertise on his show, john. >> and lisa, as you know, even though people on the right aren't defending what he said, a lot of them say look at what the bill maher said about sarah palin and what other liberals

said about sarah palin and other female conservatives. is there a double standard? >> if you read what they're blogging about and tweeting about, they would certainly say yes. this is one of the concerns you mentioned is that bill maher has said some things that we can't repeat on this family television show. and they're saying you know, bill maher home run just recently announced he's going to be giving a million dollar donation to the super pac supporting president obama. maybe the campaign, maybe the obama team should consider rejecting that $1 million donation if they're taking the high ground here. of course, they're calling it a double standard because we didn't quite see the backlash that bill maher certainly didn't see the backlash rush limbaugh is seeing. >> certain things out of line should be out of line for everybody. thanks so much. we all know football is and can be a violent sport but a coach is now accused of paying his players to go beyond the usual mayhem. the controversy over these so-called bountdis could cost him and his former players.

fred smoot, it's good to see you. you were in washington when he was a defensive coordinator. this controversy is about a bounty program where the coach says before the game, you take out, i'm going to say brett favre, you take out kurt warner, you get a bounty. do you make money doing that? >> no, you make money playing football. when you put the word bounty in it, it clouds everybody's version of what really goes on because to me, myself, i was drafted to go out and hit people. you know, when. >> to hurt them? >> yes, to hurt, not to the legally hurt them but if you want to be the best, dick butkus, ray lewis, they play with a certain chip on their shoulder. if it includes hurting people, football is a very violent sport. you can't run from it. >> you have a contract that pays you quite handsomely when you're playing. there's a system that players, not the coaches pay into the pot, right? and you get what, $1500 if you knock the quarterback out of the

game? >> let's say we're making a run for the playoffs. we need plays to be made. we as a defensive backfields, we'll get together and say all right, whoever make the play the to change the game, we all put $1,000 in the pot and he gets the pot. so it's more of an incentive based thing we do for ourselves. i look at it as the same thing. we're paid to be football players, and i think all we did was reinforce it. >> if there's a pot of money out there, the argument against this i'll call bounty system, you don't like the word, is maybe you'll go helmet to helmet supposed to taking him in the chest. you want to knock him out of the game, fair. >> >> not fair to say. when i played the game of football, that was a legal hit. now it's illegal. they're changing the image of football and when you change the image of football, a lot of the things that used to fly not going to fly anymore. one of the things that's not going to fly anymore is what you call inhaas gambling. >> you hear now coach williams,

maybe his head coach in new orleans, sean payton could be suspended a lot of fines. appropriate or inappropriate in your view? >> in my view, it's inappropriate. then you have to suspend the players that played for these guys that are retired from the nfl. how do you go penalize the new orleans saints when gregg williams at st. louis right now? i think it's a thing where something was brought to the light. i think they should you know, tell people it shouldn't be done. >> every team do this? >> put it like this. it's a culture in football. to do this, you've got to change the whole culture of football. to my rookie year to my last year, we did this. we never said go take out brett favre or emmitt smith. we said take out the guy in the other helmet. not take him out. but let's be serious right now. we're modern day gladiators. you can't tell guys not to go out and fight. >> fred smoot, we'll watch this one play out. thank you. just hours away now from the biggest day of the 2012 campaign. tonight's truth is this.

super tuesday isn't just with the numbers. it's about momentum and psychology, plus steve bridge who's made a name for himself impersonating president george w. bush. ♪

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i don't want a plunger anywhere near my coffee. not in my house. with maxwell house french roast, you let gravity do the work. [ male announcer ] maxwell house french roast. always good to the last drop. newt gingrich sees mitt romney as weak and worse. >> he can't close the deal and he can't close the deal in part because people inherently don't trust what he's saying and think

that he isn't very candid and isn't straight. >> but santorum sees mitt romney as all money, no core. >> look into the eyes of the candidate. look into what the candidates overcome and offer to this country. not just what money they have. but where's their soul, their conviction. >> but mitt romney sees mitt romney as turning a very important corner. >> the more jobs, less debt and smaller government. that's what my campaign is about. that's why i believe i'm doing well at this stage. gosh, we just won our fifth state in a row, which is washington state, which is good news. >> tonight's truth is a mix of math and psychology. a strong super tuesday for romney will undermine the case. he's the math. romney has won 52% of all delegates projected so far and he's upped the ante.

winning 61% of the delegates from those five states and odd are, he is far and away the biggest delegate winner tomorrow, the ten-state super tuesday. he is favored in massachusetts, vermont, idaho. has an outside shot at tennessee, alaska and north dakota and even if he doesn't win, it will add to their delegate haul. yes, gingrich is right. governor romney is having a hard time closing the deal and yes, santorum is right that the lopsided romney money advantage is a big reason for his success, but by the end of tomorrow night, just shy of half the states will have weighed in and barring a collapse, romney will end tomorrow night with way more state victories and delegates than any of his rivals and that's where psychology kicks in. it changes how voters see you. both santorum and gingrich know this from their own surging earlier in the race. truth is, the reason their complaints about romney are

getting sharper now is they're well aware of the super tuesday stakes and the math. here to talk truth, two romney skeptics. amy cramer, erick erickson. if romney wins six, maybe seven out of ten tomorrow, picks up well in excess of half the delegates after winning the last five states in a row, is he your nominee like it or not? >> well, look, i mean through the end of march, the delegates are proportional. it doesn't become until april when it's winner take all. nothing is going to be decided until april. >> and yet some think just about everything could be decided tomorrow night. >> if mitt romney wins ohio, i think he's the nominee and i think he's going to win ohio so i think he will be the nominee whether i like it or not. that's the reality. santorum had a brilliant moment and he lost it in michigan. he focused on cultural issues in a way that couldn't relate to

voters. he did talk about cultural issues relating to families, he didn't do that otherwise. he lost the opportunity to connect tamlys to jobs. didn't resognate with that message moving into ohio and now in georgia where he had a solid second place, he's fallen below 20%, meaning he won't get any delegates in georgia. the lights are turning out for the santorum campaign. >> if you look at our new ohio poll, santorum leads those staying they're tea party support es. if romney is your no, ma'minee, tea party, will they take a deep breath, be there in november? >> look, john, whoever our nominee is, i believe that we're going to get behind them and support them because we want to defeat barack obama, but i mean, because we don't have a front-runner right now, it's a clear indication that none of these candidates are strong with the people across the country. they're not happy. and that's exactly why tea party

express why we've been focused on the senate because we want to let this play out. you called me a romney skeptic. i'm just not happy with any of these candidates. unfortunately, we don't have a ronald reagan running and i think that's what a lot of people have wanted. >> assume gingrich wins georgia. he's not going to go anywhere because he sees mississippi, alabama, louisiana coming up. with four candidates stay in the race beyond march into april? >> the problem is the math works against mitt romney, believe it or not, because you have delegates who are committed candidates and delegates who are uncommitted to the candidates, who aren't locked in. when you look at the states, including eight winner take all-states, there's a problem with the math. they could drag this out until august, but you know and i know the pressure behind the scenes getting building. santorum super pack runs out of money and then they're left with

options. we have no money. do we continue and potentially hurt the nominee or line up behind him? >> when you look at that calculation, some say the longer this goes on, the more it helps president obama. does that matter to you? >> it's been a concern all along that these candidates are beating each other up and using all of their money to beat each other up. when president obama's out there raising money left and right, it's definitely a concern. we need a strong constitutional conservative and right now, we don't feel like we have that. >> he's mostly raising money left. >> yeah, he is raisinging money left. >> thanks for coming in. a big day tomorrow. join us tomorrow. super tuesday. noon eastern. our panel will answer questions about the presidential election and explore the issues you care about. go to cnn.com/roundtable at noon eastern tomorrow. kate bolduan is back with a late et news you need to know. >> eric holder, he says that the u.s. can legally target and kill

american citizens overseas if they're tied to terrorism and pose an immediate threat. he made the argument today in illinois months after the death of an american al-qaeda figure in yemen. critics say the decision denies american citizens their right to a trial. and a group of girl scouts was robbed of their cookie money this weekend. they fought back. they saw a man snatch the cash box from the table saturday before sliding into a get away car. instead of yelling for r help, one girl punched the passenger, another ran alongside the vehicle. unfortunately, the suspect still got away with about $200 in cash. and disgraced former new york mets star lenny dykstra was sentenced to three years in prison today. in october, he pleaded no contest to three counts of grant theft auto and filing a false financial statement.

wow. >> what you're watching is not a movie stunt. that's a real chopper crashing in the arizona desert last week while filming a stunt. it looks scary, but local police say no one was seriously injured, which was really amazing when you see that video. no word on what caused the helicopter to go down. and sad news. the comedian who made us all do a sad take, he has died. steve bridges was found dead at his l.a. home on saturday. he was 48 years old. we're going to show you a video of his 2006 performance. >> as you know, i always look forward to these dinners. >> it's just a bunch of media